


Penance

by xtricks



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Ghost Rider (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Flogging, Gen, MCU Kink Bingo, MCUKinkBingo, non-sexual bdsm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-06-01 10:23:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15141068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xtricks/pseuds/xtricks
Summary: The Ghost Rider makes the guilty suffer.





	Penance

**Author's Note:**

> This story contains non-sexual but serious flogging. And very dubious consent.

_ “I deserve it!”  _

Guilt was dark and rich and heavy in the air.  The Rider knew it like the cracked bones of his Host.  Guilt made him hungry, left a trail to follow; from the death of innocence to the souls of the wicked.  There guilt was here, and blood, but innocence didn’t stain her hands red. The Rider turned aside, she was not his prey.

The crash and boom of an explosion pulled him back around to catch the violent energy the soldier threw.  His burning bones creaked but held, unbreakable within the fire of his will. She struck again, with a shriek of wordless anger.  The guilt in her  _ burned  _ and the Rider couldn’t resist it.  The Rider screamed back, a wail that drove her to her knees, and leapt.  She rose to meet him, willing - even eager - to face his fire. There was challenge to her, and courage, and it was  _ exciting  _ to face her.  Most of the Rider’s victims begged, then bled, then died.  She rose and fought and demanded he yield.

He didn’t and she was the one to go down, sprawling on the concrete as he leaned close, flames glinting in her wide eyes as he stared at her.  Her skin was as pale as bone in his light, but softer. The thought of murder crossed his mind. Was that mercy?

The Rider leaned closer, close enough that his fire touched her fragile flesh and she cringed before realizing it didn’t burn.  His voice was like smoke, rarely heard, crackling with underlying heat. 

_ Do you deserve mercy? _

She twisted away with a cry.  “No!”

He would not give it then.  Straightening up, he twisted a hand in her collar, hauling her across the ground and ignoring her struggles to escape.  He tried. They ended up fighting another skirmish, her powers rattling his bones, all the while telling him it didn’t have to be like this. 

“You’re not a monster,” she panted, driving him back with the shudder of her power.  “Not the devil. Just different.  _ We can help you.” _

The Rider finally brought her down again, bony fingers wrapped suffocatingly around her throat.  She was trying to save _him_. 

_ I am nothing you know. _

He bound her to a girder, twisting metal to hold her wrists.  When he cut through her clothes to bare her back, she shrieked, guilt burned away in anger and fear.

“I thought you hated rapists and pedophiles!” She gasped, trying to shake lose the binding on her arms.  “You’re just like them!”

_ That is not what I offer. _

“What are you gonna do then?” She wrenched at her arms and groaned.  The bone were weak, damaged, the Rider knew bones well. He dragged thin, fire tipped fingers down the bare skin of her back.  Such a strange thing, flesh, and the hunger for it. The bone tips dug into her skin, not quite tearing, not quite burning, but raising red marks and making her hiss in pain. 

_ Make you suffer for your sins.  Isn’t that what you want? _

“I want you to suffer for  _ yours _ !”  She yelled and kicked like a mule, connecting in away that would have hurt, were he mortal.  “You’re just a murderer. A  _ killer!” _

_ I am Vengeance. For the weak.  For the innocent. For those preyed on by evil.  Shouldn’t they pay? _

The Rider stalked around the warehouse looking for something suitable to his plans.  Finding a long strap of leather, he folded it in half and returned to where she waited.  The ends of the strap slithered alongside him like serpents.

“I’ve hurt people,” she groaned, looking over her shoulder at him, black make-up smeared like a mask across her face; white skin and shadows a poor imitation of the Rider’s burning skull.  “All I do is hurt people ....”

Her guilt was thick enough to taste and he didn’t  _ understand  _ it.  The Rider hissed in frustration, sparks leaping along his wrists and down the leather in his hand before he quelled his fire.  Worse, his Host stirred in a surge of sympathy, comprehending what the Rider could not. Guilt was a tool to hunt down the wicked, nothing more.  Why should she cling to it? Why should his Host trouble him with it when they sought worthy vengeance on the streets?

He grabbed a handful of hair and wrenched her head back until he could stare into her eyes, very dark, like unlit fire, and she hates him.  He ... dislikes her. A soldier wasting energy on unearned guilt. It makes her weak and the Rider despises weakness. And waste. Leaving her like this would be a waste.

_ You want to pay? _

Her breath hitched miserably. “Yes.”

_ Then pay. _

The Rider stepped back, two long paces, and flicked the leather in his hand.  Folded like it was, with his bony hand holding it near the center, it became a makeshift flogger.  The leather wasn’t soft, it would  _ hurt _ .

The flogger hissed through the air, ending a cruel snap cross bare skin followed by her shriek of pain.  Screams meant nothing to the Rider and he landed a second, and a third blow while she struggled, the girder she was bound to shaking.  She could break free, if she tried hard enough, but she didn’t try - hard  _ enough  _ \- and that only goaded the Rider on.

Welts rose hard and bright in white diagonal lines across her back, then flushed furious, painful red seconds after.  Her cries were as angry as they were agonized and as she fought, she sobbed. Her boots scrabbled against the gritty concrete, and the jewelry she wore on her neck like chains glinted cold and bright above her pain flushed skin.  Her guilt drew him in like blood in the water, but there was no call to vengeance. The Rider struck again, with a scream of his own, laying down more welts, but not drawing blood. Not yet.

That last thought, the whisper of undeserved suffering, made his agitated Host within boil up in rage.  The Rider struggled to hold control, fighting his Host, skin rising up and burning away again across the body as they battled.  It was not his Host’s place to judge the Rider. The Rider judged. The Rider  _ was  _ judgement!

“What does Vengeance think about  _ torturing  _ a girl who don’t deserve it?”  It was Robbie’s voice, fighting his way to the surface, where he could talk and think and  _ act _ .  Skin pulled back over bone, as agonizing as always, and he threw aside the leather strap with a curse.

_ She wants to pay for guilt! I will make her pay! _

The Rider raged, maddened by the guilt he smelled in the air, tormented by the alien temptation to inflict suffering on someone who didn’t deserve his vengeance.  The wrongness of the urge was weakness, and gave Robbie the strength to overcome the Rider’s presence.

Robbie rushed over to the girl - Daisy, wasn’t it? - and stole strength from the fucking Rider to pull away the rebar bent around her wrists.  “You got  _ nothing  _ to pay for, chica.”  He tried to find a way to hold her that wouldn't hurt as she stumbled and slumped against him.

“You don’t fucking know me,” She cried, shoving at him and staggering, half bent over and gasping in pain.  Her bare back was livid with bruises and swollen welts and she flinched with every breath. Robbie winced at the sight.  “You don’t know what I’ve done -”

“Yeah I do.  You got blood on your hands,” Robbie said roughly, sick with the memory of leather in his hand, and the way it felt to hit her flesh with it.  He grabbed the girl before she went down, and she leaned against him breathing heavily, pain and anger and grief in her face and Robbie knew it all.  He tightened his grip on her arm, wanting her to hear and understand and fucking  _ believe _ .  “So do I.  It’s the price we pay, girl - to fight against the ones who  _ really  _ deserve to suffer.  That ain’t you.”

Her knees buckled and Robbie went down with her, cushining her fall.  Exhausted she slumped against him, head on his shoulder, bare skin against his leather jacket.  The Rider in him twisted in anger and confusion - something Robbie hadn’t felt from it before and he cursed the damned thing.  And himself, no less damned.

“Listen to me, chica,” he said, “No one can take that guilt away.  You gotta let it go.”

She just shook her head and Robbie knew why.  He wasn’t letting go of his own guilt either, not this, not for what his hands had done.  Her blood was on his hands and he’d pay.

 

END 

 

(7/2/18)


End file.
